Monday 7 May 2012

The Mountain - I Sized It Up

Today I counted all the books that I own that I still have to read. Not ebook ones, I'm way to scared to count those, but just the books I have on my bookshelves. Guys, I was scared. I was afraid The Mountain would be like this:


I'm proud to say, it was more like this:


My TBR Mountain is more like a TBR Hill. You still don't want to climb it, but it doesn't scare you as much as its snow-topped big brother. As it turns out, I have 117 unread books. That's right, I passed the one-hundred mark. But I was fearing that I sneakily passed the two hundred too when I was looking the other way. I am so, so glad that it's just 117. That means that if I would stop blogging entirely, and I would continue reading as much as I do now, I would read through all of my books in just one year. That really doesn't feel like an endless supply, as I thought it would be.

Don't get me wrong, it's way too much still.

But I'm not beyond saviour, and that's something I'm proud of. I'm not buried by unread books just yet. So right here, right now, I declare a challenge with myself. I am going to reduce the size of my pile this year. At the end of this year in December, I will count all of my TBR books again. And it will not be 117 or more. Let's make a goal.

At the end of this year, I will have reduced my TBR Hill to 80 books.

Because, let's be honest, I will still be buying new books. I'll still get books for review. But I'll try to keep up with my reading, and won't go on a book buying spree when I don't even have time to read. I'll add a "Size of the Hill" part to my Monthly Updates from now on, so you guys can all follow my progress. Wish me luck!

I would love to know how your TBR Mountains are doing. When was the last time you dared to count? Feel free to leave a comment and share your experiences (:

20 comments:

sandra said...

I keep track of my physical TBR pile on Goodreads shelves and it's... oh, 110 books. E-books not counted in, crapy if I would add those too... not good. :D Good luck with the challenge and keep us posted. ^^

Miss Page-Turner said...

Haha I totally know that "problem". I have way too many books, buy too many books and don't have that much time to read them all. Just some like authors do an authors retreat, we should do one for readers;)

Amanda @ On a Book Bender said...

You are very brave for tackling the TBR mountain (or hill, as it turned out to be).  I'm a little scared to!

Ashley Evans said...

This is a great challenge!  I hope you succeed in chipping away at your TBR pile!

Celine said...

Thanks Ashley!

Celine said...

Hehe, it was definitely scary. We bloggers are all a tiny bit in denial about how many unread books we have (:

Celine said...

Oh, that would be so awesome. I'm afraid we wouldn't get any reading done, discussing all these great books out there ^^

Celine said...

Ha, we're very close to each other then! Thanks, and I will be sure to let you all know how it goes (: I hope it goes down instead of up, lol

Beth G said...

Celine, you are so brave!  This is my biggest obstacle in reading, the infamous TBR pile.  I'm scared to count mine up, even though I know I should face the mountain head on...

Lianne Lavoie said...

My TBR list is my default shelf on Goodreads, so it's constantly staring me in the face. It's sitting at 680 right now, and just refuses to go down! I'm definitely firmly in "mountain" territory. I'm participating in Operation: TBR Reduction, which has the goal of decreasing the pile every month (the challenge just started, so we'll see how successful I am!). Good luck with your goals!! :)

jessasank said...

It's so funny that you're posting this because I just posted about mine today! (http://thoughtsatoneinthemorning.blogspot.com/2012/05/question-of-moment-how-bad-is-your-tbr.html) I'm only at 81, but that still seems like a lot. I've been working on getting it down, and don't plan on purchasing too many books in the near future. Glad to see you're going to work on reducing the hill! A lot of us are in need of doing it, so we can all support each other. ^_^

Linny @ Linnys Literature said...

Glad to see it was just baby brother hill and not the mountain, but still! Wow, that's a lot of books. I believe in you though! A year definitely isn't too bad. Well, I'll be here waiting to hear those 117 book reviews, bring 'em on! ;)

Celine said...

Thanks Beth! I hope you'll find the courage to face your mountain too (:

Celine said...

Whoa, that's in the Mount Everest category indeed. Good luck on the challenge Lianne, it sounds like a great one! (: Thanks for stopping by and the kind words

Celine said...

81 is quite a lot too, it really just depends on how fast you read. I know some people that read 300 books every year, for them 80 would be just a few months of reading (:

Hehe, I'm glad more people are trying to reduce their TBRs, now we can cheer each other on :D

Celine said...

Hehe, thanks Linny! Hmmm it would be awesome if I could write 117 reviews this year. I'm at 39 right now. I challenge you to read all of my upcoming ones, haha! :D

leeanna c said...

Good luck! 

I know that battle well. The pile of books I own but haven't read is massive. I use Goodreads to keep track of everything, and my "to-read" shelf has over a thousand books. That count isn't entirely accurate, though, because I can't keep track exactly the way I would like. I'd still put it in the high hundreds though :( I stocked up like crazy when bookstores by me were going out of business. I tend to buy books that I've read in the past and liked, but maybe haven't read since loading everything into Goodreads. 

Celine said...

Thanks Leeanna! Oh, keeping track on Goodreads is a good one. I tried that some time but I always forget adding books I got.

Aww, I can totally understand though that you went a little crazy when the bookstores were closing up. The thought of all these awesome stores gone still makes me a little bit sad.

leeanna c said...

Here's a tip -- if you have a smartphone, there's a Goodreads app. You can scan in all your books and pick which shelves they go on. As soon as a book comes in my house, I scan it. The only thing you can't do it for is ARCs.

Me too. Now there's one book store within a 50 mile radius of me, and all they carry is the popular stuff. Yay for Book Depository. I wish there were some indie stores in my area, but they disappeared a long time ago. 

Celine said...

Too bad I don't own a smartphone ): It's a great idea though, I might lend my boyfriend's iPhone to categorise all of my books. They really do need some categorising. I don't own that many ARCs anyway so that won't be that much of a problem.

My favourite bookstore has gone bankrupt too.. I hope someone buys it before it's too late

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